The economic lunacy of light rail has been an occasional topic on this blog (here, here, here, and here). However, blogHouston.net has a much more impressive archive of insightful posts over the past year on the foibles of the Houston Metropolitan Transit Authority, which has completely redesigned Houston’s public transit system over the past decade from a flexible one based primarily on bus transit to an inflexible one based primarily on light rail.
Well, as this Anne Linehan post from today points out, that inflexible light rail system is turning out to be a rather expensive one, too. This Chronicle story reports the shocking news:
Metro wants to spend an additional $104 million on its Main Street light rail line to almost double the number of trains and fix costly problems it blames on construction errors.
Metropolitan Transit Authority president and CEO Frank Wilson laid out his wish list to the agency’s board Thursday, shortly after releasing statistics that show surging rail ridership but decreased numbers of bus riders and overall customers.
The cost Metro estimates for the improvements would raise the bill for what Metro calls its Red Line ? the 7.5-mile route from downtown to Reliant Park ? by about a third.
At the same time, the agency is seeking federal money to help build four light rail extensions with a combined price tag of $1.7 billion.
The Chronicle goes on to report that, although light rail ridership has increased, the total number of people using Metro mass transit (i.e., light rail and buses) has declined by 3% over the past year.
Not exactly the return on investment that one would wish for after plunking down $325 million to build the 7.5 mile light rail system.
At any rate, Ms. Linehan uses her skill in translating Metro-speak to explain why Metro officials believe that spending another cool $104 mil on the existing light rail line is a good idea:
“We cut corners building the 7.5 miles of downtown light rail; we have dismantled bus and trolley service in order to feed the light rail; we don’t have a consistent method for collecting fares so we can’t talk about ‘paid ridership;’ we are bleeding passengers systemwide even though Houston’s population has increased; and now we’d like an extra $100 million to help fix our mess.”
Thus, the scam of this publicly-financed rail system continues to eat money voraciously with no end in sight. The economic benefit of light rail is actually highly concentrated in only a few interest groups, such as elected officials who enjoy touting their political “accomplishment,” environmental groups who seek to gain political influence, construction-related firms who can soak the public till, and real estate developers who enjoy the increase in the value of their property along the rail line. Inasmuch as none of these reasons for mass transit are particularly appealing to the vast majority of the electorate, the interest groups disguise their goals behind disingenuous claims that rail lines will reduce traffic congestion, curb air pollution, or — the one I like best — make a city “world class.” In reality, rail transit has never been an efficient means to reduce either congestion or air pollution, and a rail line has certainly never made a city “world class.”
On the other hand, the costs of such systems are widely dispersed among the local population. Thus, the many who stand to lose will lose only a little while the few who stand to gain will gain a lot. As a result, it is usually not worth the relatively small cost per taxpayer for most citizens to spend any substantial amount of time or money lobbying against even an uneconomic rail system. With political leadership more interested in shiny toys than pro forma operating statements, the publicly-financed rail systems continue to infect metro areas like a bad virus, and the cost of treating this civic virus grows larger each month.
Finally, the foregoing analysis does not even count the cost associated with this carnage.
Where is the Lord of Regulation when you really need him? ;^)
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The Greater Houston Partnership Monday named Jeff Moseley as its new Executive Director to replace Jim Kollaer, who announced his resignation in February after 15 years in that position. Mr. Moseley is a former Denton County Judge who is currently the Executive Director of Texas Economic Development office, an agency that markets Texas for business and tourism development. Here is the Chronicle story on the appointment.
